In general, the semiconductor element is used for the electronic apparatus. The projection type display apparatus for projecting an image includes a semiconductor element such as a light emitting element or an image forming element. Such a semiconductor element generates heat when operated.
The increased temperature of the semiconductor element may disable the normal operation of the semiconductor element. In particular, when the temperature of the light emitting element serving as a light source for the projection type display apparatus increases, the emission efficiency of the light emitting element declines, thus preventing the light emitting element from supplying a sufficient amount of light. As a result, the brightness of the projected image is reduced. For this reason, there has been proposed a structure for cooling the semiconductor element (hereinafter, referred to as “semiconductor element cooling structure”).
The example of the semiconductor element cooling structure is disclosed in JP2012-9760A (hereinafter, referred to as “Patent Literature 1”). Hereinafter, the semiconductor element cooling structure disclosed in Patent Literature 1 will be described.
The semiconductor element cooling structure includes a light emitting element that is a semiconductor element, and a heat sink made of a metallic material such as aluminum or copper. The light emitting element includes a lead terminal extending from the bottom surface of an element body, and the lead terminal is electrically connected to a substrate. The substrate is housed in a U-shaped groove formed in the front side of the heat sink, and the bottom surface of the element body is in contact with the front side of the heat sink. The heat sink absorbs and discharges heat from the element body, thereby cooling the light emitting element.
The substrate is disposed along the extending direction of the lead terminal. Accordingly, the opening of the groove can be relatively small, and the area of the portion of the bottom surface of the element body in contact with the front side of the heat sink (hereinafter, referred to as “contact portion”) can be relatively large. The large area of the contact portion facilitates movement of the heat of the element body to the heat sink, thereby facilitating cooling of the light emitting element.